Valmet Automotive: Talbot Horizons Built in Finland

Valmet Automotive cars of Finland

Since 1969, the Finnish Valmet Automotive complex in Uusikaupunki (pronounced oo-see-cow-punky) on the southwest coast of Finland, about 140 miles north of Helsinki, has produced a wide variety of niche vehicles.

Originally a joint venture by Saab-Scania AB (of Sweden) and the Finnish Valmet Corporation, Valmet Automotive was originally known as Saab-Valmet, and produced Saabs. In 1992, Valmet Corporation became the sole owner of the company, and in July 1999, Valmet merged with Rauma to form Metso, one of the world's leaders in paper processing and automation. Currently Valmet Automotive, an independent European contract manufacturer of premium specialty cars, accounts for about five percent of Metso sales.

Many different makes and models of vehicles have been produced by Valmet Automotive over the years, including the Lada Samara, Porsche Boxster, and many Saab models. The Tabot production figures were:

Model

Years produced

Amount

Talbot Horizon

1979-1985

17,931

Talbot 1510 / Solara

1979-1985

14,047

NB: Some of the Horizon models were converted to run on a type of "petrol" (apparently kerosene?) with an octane rating of between 60-70, normally used in marine engines or agricultural machinery.

Additional Valmet Automotive information from gstromsten

The Petro Horizon was a purely Finnish invention, where the engine was converted to be able to run on motorpetrolem due to a search for cheaper alternatives to gasoline at the end of the 1970s. First the Valmet factory converted
Saabs, then when Talbots were added to the range of the factory, the Horizon was converted.

The conversion took away a sizeable chunk of horsepower because compression had to be lowered significantly,
and the motorpetroleum affects the oil of the engine,
so intervals for oil change had to be shortened considerably, but still you could expect lower mileage and a noticeable smell. Finnish tinkering with motorpetroleum ended because of the government's taxation of vehicles and fuel, which finally killed off the petro experiment together with its patchy distribution network.
The government had chosen to tax alternative, cheaper fuels higher to compensate for their lower initial cost. (Cars and fuel for them has traditionally been one of the government's cash cows, a fact noticeable when checking out the car fleet in use in Finland.)

Valmet Automotive did manufacture the 1510, Horizon and Solara. At first the cars were identical to the ones assembled in France, but with time Valmet did tweak them a lot, especially the interior, where seats and other items were taken from the Saab models that the factory manufactured together with the Talbots.

The Euro-Samara was an interesting thing in itself. Valmet's designers did what was possible to give it a facelift and together with superior build quality compared to the original, but it was not exactly a commercial success ...